Heavy Boots & The Alarm Clock

It was a hot summer night.

Even the crickets and the fireflies seemed to be tired from the heat. Silence mingled effortlessly with the sweat of the farmers that still had the fields wet. And scraping, half-crawling through the mud was a young lad of about 20.

The full moon reflected on his face – blackened hollow eyes leering eerily into empty darkness. The iron chains on his feet stopped him from standing up. His face, arms and bare back glistened with blood, oozing out with every movement of his muscles, from deep lacerations made by a thousand hits from the whip.

The whip that dangled like a snake spewing venom.

From the hands of one of the dozen men wearing heavy military boots. Thud after Thud, they followed the crawling, half-dead corpse. Like wolves following a dying foe.

“That is his fucking village, alright”. “Ji, Saheb.”

The village courtyard had been swept clean. Only to be dyed dark red as the boy panted onto it, muddied by the boots following him. They stood there – 12 men and a half-dead corpse, waiting for a door to fling open and a woman shrieking out to comfort her son.

Nothing happened. Except that the crickets were awake now.

The Brit officer was losing his patience. A four-mile walk through muddy paddy fields and mosquitoes for nothing. He whipped the boy hard on his back. Half the whip hit the ground, producing a weird ‘Crack’ that mixed with the boy’s gurgled shriek.

“Motherfucker.” 

“Water.” The boy half-whispered into the night.

You could almost see the dozens of pairs of eyes flinch shut from behind the boarded doors and windows. Yes, they were watching. The whole village was watching their son. Dying, under a full moon night.

“Show us the house. And you shall have water.” The boy spit blood onto the brick floor of the courtyard, “Ha. Ha. I sure will.”

The second officer kicked him in the head. The boy writhed in pain.

“Bloody Fucking Natives”.

Inside the second house on the left lane off the courtyard, someone moved.

“Ma, please. Let me go. Dada will die.”
“NO. Please Reema. He killed Inspector Sands. If they know that this was where he was hiding, they will burn the whole place down”, the mother knew she had to choke her tears, if the village was to live.  
“But Ma..”
“NO. Give that glass to me. GIVE IT TO ME..”

*CLAANKK*!! The bronze glass landed with a thundering clatter on the windowsill, and rolled off onto the floor.   

The sound echoed around the village courtyard like a giant bell ringing to the chimes of death.

Was that a smile curling up on the corners of the Officer’s mouth? Was it failure that now shone through the eyes of the battered lad? Could this be the end of it all…

*TRRRINGGGG*

Oh fuck! It is 8:00 a.m. already. Yours truly is going to be really late for office today. Damnation be damned! I leaped off my bed and ran towards the bathroom, grasping the day’s paper on the way.

Waaaait a minute. The big tri-colour on the front page could only mean one thing! It’s Republic Day.

Haha. Fuck you Alarm Clock. I am going back to sleep! Yaay!

What? What happened to the young lad and his village? Who cares?

They probably died. Trying to get us our freedom. To sleep.

I mean what else could you do on a boring holiday, right?

What are your plans on this Republic Day by the way?!

Autos & the Great Class Divide

Prologue – By autos, I do not mean the swanky Volkswagen Jetta or the Lamborghini Gallardo. I mean this. So if you had any plans to read up an article on your dream ride, dream more about it, and then get back to coding software, this is NOT for you.

Ok, so – most of you who stayed, know how cool these rides are. And how lame city traffic would be without them. I mean which fancy car can fit in 7 guys AND the driver, and still do a decent 70? Right. Without autos, life for us low-lives would be Zilch. Naught. Jhiro.

Anyway, once upon a time in West Bengaul (that’s how Bongs pronounce it, so relax!), autos ruled the roads. They roared, callously did wheelies, paralyzed cyclists and honked dead people deaf. And more importantly, they were Black. Black – ala Samuel Jackson. And like Samuel fuckin’ Jackson, they didn’t fuckin’ care.

And the even-blacker drivers of these black panthers were in a league of their own. They would swivel 100 degrees towards oncoming traffic, exchange gutkha with their north-bound brothers and chew out any dissidents then and there. With 206 auto-unions (last I counted, it was actually 286) to back them, who could challenge thy manhood, Herr Jackson(s)?

However, many gutkha-covered-moons later, a great, great revolution swept the Bengaul plains, and the roads too!

A new breed of autos had emerged – Tadaa!! C.N.G.!!

And before you knew it, the Great Class Divide was born. Green was the new White. Black was the new… Err… Black.  

The green autos were swanky, had fresh coats of shiny paint and most importantly, were elegantly subtle while on the move. And they had a certain autocratic, cocky demeanor while being on the move.

And as was expected, it irritated the fuck out of the Blacks. They felt downright ostracized – and even more inferior than their rusted bolts could mirror. Outrage soon turned to Enrage-ment. And thus, the Never-ending Feud of the Auto-bots was born.

Now, Black autos would swivel 100 degrees towards oncoming traffic, only to exchange domestic-borne pleasantries with the north-bound Green rival, like “tor maa ke mere gutkha kore debo” (‘I will beat your mother into the gutkha’ – Trust me, it sounded much more menacing in the native language!) and likewise, 7 screaming passengers notwithstanding.    

Apparently, 7 screaming passengers is no mean deal, especially when they are all trained in Rabindra Sangeet – hence you can imagine the amount of pent up anger the Black autos had to vent. And vent they did. Every other day, Green autos fell prey to Blacks. Swathes of scraped-off paint, headlights & rear-view mirrors littered the streets of Bangla. And, obviously, all of the said collateral damage was for the Greens.

After all, what did the Blacks have to lose anyway?

Till this very day, the bloodthirst continues.

And to top it all, like in the Black Supremacy & the Black Panther Party era, caught in the feuds of the Blacks & Whites (or Greens) were the Asians. This class included the Black autos who got themselves painted Green to enjoy the luxuries of the Green life, and yet not get their rears slashed open by the Blacks. Turncoats you say? Wise guys, I insist!

And so everyday, while going to work, yours truly does a 28-minute ‘sashtanga pranaam’ before the Goddess Durga, and wears a Kuver Kunji & Dayal Baba’s kavach– wears war paint ala Geronimo and walks out to the mercy of the autos. For being one of the very few ones not trained in Rabindra Sangeet, death will be pretty silent. And boring. Yours truly certainly does not deserve that.

And off I go!

As I said, what would our life be without the Autos?!